Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny is the main protagonist of the animated series Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies and one of the two triagonists in the 2003 live-action/animated film, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, and the deuteragonist in the 1996 live-action/animated film, Space Jam. Personality & Catchphrases He is a cunning, carefree, charismatic, and smart rabbit. These personality traits are what gives him an advantage over his enemies, rivals and opponents. He is also known for his famous catch phrase; "Eh, what's up, doc?", which he typically uses as a greeting to anyone he encounters (usually while munching a carrot). Bugs is characterized as being clever and capable of outsmarting anyone who antagonizes him, including Elmer Fudd, Yosemite Sam, Willoughby, Marvin The Martian, Beaky Buzzard, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, the Tasmanian Devil, Cecil Turtle, Witch Hazel, Rocky and Mugsy, Wile E. Coyote, The Crusher, The Gremlin, Count Bloodcount, and a whole bunch of others. Bugs almost always wins these contentions, a story pattern which recurs in Looney Tunes cartoons directed by Chuck Jones. Concerned that viewers would lose sympathy for an aggressive protagonist who always won, Chuck arranged for Bugs to be bullied, cheated, or threatened by the antagonists while minding his own business, justifying his subsequent antics as retaliation or self-defense. He's also been known to break The 4th Wall by "communicating" with the audience, either by explaining the situation (e.g. "Be with you in a minute, folks!"), describing someone to the audience (e.g. "Feisty, ain't they?"), clueing in on the story (e.g. "That happens to him all during the picture, folks."), explaining that one of his antagonists' actions have pushed him to the breaking point ("Of course you know, this means war."), admitting his own deviousness toward his antagonists ("Gee, ain't I a stinker?"), etc. When Bugs made his appearance, he promptly replaced Daffy Duck as the most popular Warner Bros. character. Daffy, jealous of his cartoon counterpart's ascension to fame, has on many occasions attempted to dethrone the rabbit. But he has never truly succeeded, always being outsmarted by the clever hare. However, as time passed on, Bugs and Daffy's rivalry has turned friendlier in nature as the two usually hang out together in most cartoons and Bugs considers Daffy his best friend despite his faults, to which Daffy says the same thing. Bugs will usually try to placate the antagonist and avoid contention, but when a villain pushes him too far, Bugs may address the audience and invoke his catchphrase "Of course you realize this means war!" before he retaliates, and the retaliation will be devastating. This line was taken from Groucho Marx and others in the 1933 film Duck Soup and was also used in the 1935 Marx film A Night at the Opera. Bugs would pay homage to Groucho in other ways, such as occasionally adopting his stooped walk or leering eyebrow-raising (in Hair-Raising Hare, for example) or sometimes with a direct impersonation (as in Slick Hare). Other directors, such as Friz Freleng, characterized Bugs as altruistic. When Bugs meets other successful characters (such as Cecil Turtle in Tortoise Beats Hare, or, in World War II, the Gremlin of Falling Hare), his overconfidence becomes a disadvantage. Most of Bugs' adversaries are extremely dim-witted, and Bugs is easily able to outwit and torment them, although on occasion they will manage to get the best of Bugs. Daffy Duck, who is arguably more intelligent but less clever, is unaffected by Bugs' usual schemes, which usually results in the two trying to outsmart the other with Bugs always triumphing in the end. However, there are only 4 antagonists that successfully defeats Bugs in the end of the cartoon, such as Cecil Turtle, the Gremlin from Falling Hare, the unnamed mouse from Rhapsody Rabbit, and the fly from Baton Bunny. During the 1940s, Bugs started off immature and wild (similar to Daffy), but by the 1950s his personality matured and his attitude became more refined and less frenetic. Although often shown as highly clever, Bugs is never actually malicious, and only acts as such in self-defense against his aggressors. The only exceptions where Bugs ever serves as an antagonist are the following: Elmer's Pet Rabbit, Wabbit Twouble, The Wacky Wabbit, Buckaroo Bugs and Duck Amuck; Elmer's Pet Rabbit depicts him completely out-of-character with a more aggressive, arrogant, almost thuggish personality. Wabbit Twouble and The Wacky Wabbit''depict him as a prankster harassing Elmer Fudd in the vein of early Daffy Duck/Porky Pig cartoons featuring the screwball Daffy as the tormentor. ''Buckaroo Bugs depicts him as a true villain, while Duck Amuck depicts him as far more sadistic than usual, as he becomes an animator and uses his newfound powers to torture Daffy. Bugs Bunny's nonchalant carrot-chewing standing position, as explained by Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng, and Bob Clampett, originated in a scene in the 1934 film It Happened One Night, in which Clark Gable's character leans against a fence, eating carrots rapidly and talking with his mouth full to Claudette Colbert's character. This scene was well known while the film was popular, and viewers at the time likely recognized Bugs Bunny's behavior as satire. The carrot-chewing scenes are generally followed by Bugs Bunny's most well-known catchphrase, "What's up, Doc?", which was written by director Tex Avery for his first Bugs Bunny short, 1940's A Wild Hare. Avery explained later that it was a common expression in his native Texas and that he did not think much of the phrase. When the short was first screened in theaters, the "What's up, Doc?" scene generated a tremendously positive audience reaction. As a result, the scene became a recurring element in subsequent films and cartoons. The phrase was sometimes modified for a situation. For example, Bugs says "What's up, dogs?" to the antagonists in A Hare Grows In Manhattan, "What's up, Duke?" to the knight in Knight-Mare Hare and "What's up, prune-face?" to the aged Elmer in The Old Grey Hare. He might also greet Daffy with "What's up, Duck?" He used one variation, "What's all the hub-bub, bub?" only once, in Falling Hare. Another variation is used in Looney Tunes: Back In Action when he greets a bubble gun-yielding Marvin The Martian saying "What's up, Darth?" (a reference to Darth Vader from the Star Wars film series). Several Chuck Jones shorts in the late 1940s and 1950's depict Bugs travelling via cross-country (and, in some cases, intercontinental) tunnel-digging, ending up in places as varied as Mexico (Bully For Bugs), The Himalayas (The Abominable Snow Rabbit) and Antarctica (Frigid Hare) all because he "shoulda taken that left toin at Albukoikee." He first utters that phrase in 1945's Herr Meets Hare, when he emerges in the Black Forest, a cartoon seldom seen today due to its blatantly topical subject matter. When Hermann Göring says to Bugs, "Zair is no Las Vegas in Chermany" and takes a potshot at Bugs, Bugs dives into his hole and says, "Joimany? YIPE!", as Bugs realizes he's behind enemy lines. The confused response to his "left toin" comment also followed a pattern. For example, when he tunnels into Scotland in My Bunny Lies Over The Sea, while thinking he's heading for the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, California, it provides another chance for an ethnic stereotype: "Therrre's no La Brrrea Tarrr Pits in Scotland!" (to which Bugs responds, "Uh...what's up, Mac-doc?"). A couple of late-1950s/early 1960s shorts of this ilk also featured Daffy Duck traveling with Bugs ("Since when is Pismo Beach inside a cave?!"). Bugs Bunny has some similarities to figures from mythology and folklore, such as Br'er Rabbit, Nanabozho, or Anansi, and might be seen as a modern trickster (for example, he repeatedly uses cross-dressing mischievously). Unlike most cartoon characters, however, Bugs Bunny is rarely defeated in his own games of trickery. One exception to this is the short Hare Brush, in which Elmer Fudd ultimately carries the day at the end; however, critics note that in this short, Elmer and Bugs assume each other's personalities—through mental illness and hypnosis, respectively—and it is only by becoming Bugs that Elmer can win. However, Bugs was beaten at his own game. In the short Duck Amuck he torments Daffy Duck as the unseen animator, ending with his line, "Ain't I a stinker?" Bugs feels the same wrath of an unseen animator in the short Rabbit Rampage where he is in turn tormented by Elmer Fudd. At the end of the clip Elmer gleefully exclaims, 'Well, I finally got even with that scwewy wabbit!" Bugs wears white gloves, which he is rarely seen without, although he may remove one and use it for slapping an opponent to predicate a duel. Another glove-less example is Long-Haired Hare, where Bugs pretends to be the famed conductor Leopold Stokowski and instructs opera star "Giovanni Jones" to sing and to hold a high note. As Giovanni Jones is turning red with the strain, Bugs slips his left hand out of its glove, leaving the glove hovering in the air in order to command Jones to continue to hold the high note. Bugs then nips down to the mail drop to order, and then to receive, a pair of ear defenders. Bugs puts on the ear defenders and then zips back into the amphitheater and reinserts his hand into his glove as singer Jones is writhing on the stage, still holding that same high note. Bugs Bunny is also a master of disguise: he can wear any disguise that he wants to confuse his enemies: in Bowery Bugs he uses diverse disguises: fakir, gentleman, woman, baker and finally policeman. This ability of disguise makes Bugs famous because we can recognize him while at the same time realizing that his enemies are stumped. Bugs has a certain preference for the female disguise: Taz, Elmer Fudd, Yosemite Sam were fooled by this sexy bunny (woman) and in Hare Trimmed, Sam discovers the real face of "Granny" (Bugs's disguise) in the church where they attempt to get married. Bugs dressed as a female hunter, a temptress, the beautiful Brunhlide, a sexy lady and many others to fool Elmer Fudd and he also kissed him in his nose twice (Bugs and Elmer also happily got married in the end of Rabbit of Seville as the bride and Bugs as the groom, as well as in Bugs' Bonnets). For all the gullible victims off all these disguises, however, for some reason, Daffy Duck and Cecil Turtle were among those who are never fooled. Bugs Bunny may also have some mystical potential. In Knight-Mare Hare he was able to return to his bunny form (after being transformed into a donkey) by removing his donkey form as if it were a suit. Merlin of Monroe (the wizard) was unable to do the same thing. Later Bugs Bunny defeated the Count Blood Count in a magical spell duel. However, the story was a dream and Bugs Bunny's victory over Count Blood Count was a result of his intellect, not innate magical power. History Happy Rabbit A rabbit (named as "Happy Rabbit") with some of the personality of Bugs, though looking very different, first appears in the cartoon short Porky's Hare Hunt, released on April 30, 1938. Co-directed by Ben "Bugs" Hardaway and an uncredited Cal Dalton (who was responsible for the initial design of Happy), this short has an almost identical plot to Tex Avery's 1937 cartoon Porky's Duck Hunt, which had introduced Daffy Duck. Porky Pig is again cast as a hunter tracking a silly prey less interested in escape than in driving his pursuer insane. The latter short replaces the little black duck with a small white rabbit. Happy introduces himself with the odd expression "Jiggers, fellers", and Mel Blanc gave Happy a voice and laugh almost like that he would later use for Woody Woodpecker. This cartoon also first uses the famous Groucho Marx line, "Of course you realize, this means war!" This rabbit was so popular with its audience that the Schlesinger staff decided to use it again. In fact, many of Groucho's film characters' attitude and mannerisms would be an inspiration for Bugs. Happy appears again in 1939's Prest-O Change-O, directed by Chuck Jones, where he is the pet rabbit of unseen character Sham-Fu the Magician. Two dogs, fleeing the local dogcatcher, enter his absent master's house. Happy harasses them, but is ultimately bested by the bigger of the two dogs. His third appearance is in another 1939 cartoon, Hare-um Scare-um, directed by Dalton and Hardaway. This short, the first where he is depicted as a gray bunny instead of a white one, is also notable for Happy's first singing role. Charlie Thorson, lead animator on the short, gave the character a name. He had written "Bugs' Bunny" on the model sheet that he drew for Hardaway, implying that he considered the rabbit model sheet to be Hardaway's property. In promotional material for the short, including a surviving 1939 presskit, the name on the model sheet was altered to become the rabbit's own name: "Bugs" Bunny (quotation marks only used at the very beginning). In his later years, Mel Blanc stated that a proposed name was "Happy Rabbit". Oddly, "Happy" was only used in reference to Bugs Hardaway. In the cartoon Hare-um Scare-um, a newspaper headline reads, "Happy Hardaway". In Chuck Jones' Elmer's Candid Camera Happy first meets Elmer Fudd. This rabbit looks more like the present-day Bugs, taller and with a similar face. This rabbit, however, speaks with a rural drawl. The early version of Elmer is also different from the present-day one, much fatter and taller, although Arthur Q. Bryan's voice is the same as it would be later. In Robert Clampett's 1940 Patient Porky, a similar rabbit appears to trick the audience into thinking that 750 rabbits have been born. Bugs Bunny emerges A Wild Hare, directed by Tex Avery and released on July 27, 1940, is the first cartoon where both Elmer Fudd and Bugs are shown in their fully developed forms as hunter and tormentor. In this cartoon Mel Blanc first uses what would become the standard voice of Bugs. And Bugs first emerges from his rabbit hole to ask Elmer, "What's up, Doc?" Animation historian Joe Adamson counts A Wild Hare as the first "official" Bugs Bunny short. Bugs's second appearance in Jones's Elmer's Pet Rabbit introduces the audience to the name Bugs Bunny, which until then had only been used among the Termite Terrace employees. It was also the first short where he received billing under his now-famous name, but the card, "featuring Bugs Bunny", was just slapped on the end of the completed short's opening titles when A Wild Hare proved an unexpected success. The rabbit here is in look and voice identical to the one in Jones' earlier Elmer's Candid Camera. Bugs in his Wild Hare likeness appeared in five more shorts during 1941. Tortoise Beats Hare, directed by Tex Avery, features the first appearance of Cecil Turtle; Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt, is the first Bugs Bunny short directed by Friz Freleng; All This and Rabbit Stew, directed by Avery, has Bugs tracked by a little African-American hunter (based heavily on racial stereotypes); The Heckling Hare was the final Bugs short Avery worked on before being fired (Avery and producer Schlesinger vehemently disagreed over the ending gag of The Heckling Hare, and Avery refused to compromise his creative principles) and leaving for MGM; and Wabbit Twouble, the first Bugs short directed by Robert Clampett. Wabbit Twouble was also the first of five Bugs shorts to feature a chubbier remodel of Elmer Fudd, a short-lived attempt to have Fudd more closely resemble his voice actor, comedian Arthur Q. Bryan. World War II By 1942, Bugs had become the number one star of Merrie Melodies. The series had originally been intended only for one-shot characters in shorts after several early attempts to introduce characters (Foxy, Goopy Geer and Piggy) failed under Harman–Ising. (In 1937, under Schlesinger, it had started introducing newer characters.) Bugs' 1942 shorts included Friz Freleng's The Wabbit Who Came to Supper, and the Robert Clampett shorts The Wacky Wabbit and Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid (which introduced Beaky Buzzard). Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid shows a slight redesign of Bugs, with less-prominent front teeth and a rounder head. The character was reworked by Robert McKimson, then an animator in Robert Clampett's unit. The redesign at first was only used in the shorts created by Clampett's unit, but in time it would be taken up by the other directors, with Freleng and Frank Tashlin the first. When McKimson was himself promoted to director, he created yet another version, with more slanted eyes, longer teeth and a much larger mouth. He used this version until 1949 (as did Art Davis for the one Bugs Bunny cartoon he directed) when he started using the version he had designed for Clampett. Jones would come up with his own slight modification, and the voice had slight variations between the units. Other 1942 Bugs shorts included Chuck Jones' Hold the Lion, Please, Freleng's Fresh Hare and The Hare-Brained Hypnotist (which restores Elmer Fudd to his previous size), and Jones' Case of the Missing Hare. Bugs also made cameos in Tex Avery's final Warner Bros. short, Crazy Cruise, and stars in the two-minute United States war bonds commercial film Any Bonds Today. Bugs became more popular during World War II because of his free and easy attitude, and began receiving special star billing in his cartoons by 1943. By that time Warner Bros. had become the most profitable cartoon studio in the United States. In company with cartoon studios such as Disney and Famous Studios, Warners put its characters against the period's biggest enemies, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and the Japanese. The 1944 short Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips features Bugs at odds with a group of Japanese soldiers. This cartoon has since been pulled from distribution due to its racial stereotypes. He also faces off against Herman Goering and Hitler in Herr Meets Hare, which introduced his well-known reference to Albuquerque as he mistakenly winds up in the Black Forest of 'Joimany' instead of Las Vegas, Nevada. Since Bugs' debut in A Wild Hare, he had appeared only in color Merrie Melodie cartoons (making him one of the few recurring characters created for that series in the Leon Schlesinger era prior to the full conversion to color), alongside Elmer's prototype Egghead, Inki, Sniffles, and Elmer himself—who was heard but not seen in the 1942 Looney Tunes cartoon Nutty News, and made his first formal appearance in that series in 1943's To Duck or Not to Duck. While he made a cameo appearance in the 1943 Porky and Daffy cartoon Porky Pig's Feat this was his only appearance in a black-and-white Looney Tune cartoon. He did not star in a cartoon in the Looney Tunes series until that series made its complete conversion to only color cartoons beginning with 1944 releases. Buckaroo Bugs was Bugs' first cartoon in the Looney Tunes series, and was also the last WB cartoon to credit Leon Schlesinger. Among his most notable civilian shorts during this period are Bob Clampett's Tortoise Wins by a Hare (a sequel to 1941's Tortoise Beats Hare); A Corny Concerto (a spoof of Disney's Fantasia); Falling Hare; What's Cookin' Doc?; Chuck Jones's Superman parody Super-Rabbit; and Freleng's Little Red Riding Rabbit. The 1944 short Bugs Bunny and the Three Bears introduces Jones' The Three Bears characters. At the end of the cartoon Super-Rabbit, Bugs appears wearing a United States Marine Corps dress blue uniform. As a result, the Marine Corps made Bugs an honorary Marine Master Sergeant. From 1943 to 1946, Bugs was the official mascot of Kingman Army Air Field, Kingman, Arizona, where thousands of aerial gunners were trained during World War II. Some notable trainees included Clark Gable and Charles Bronson. Bugs also served as the mascot for 530 Squadron of the 380th Bombardment Group, 5th Air Force, U.S. Air Force, which was attached to the Royal Australian Air Force and operated out of Australia's Northern Territory from 1943 to 1945, flying B-24 Liberator bombers. Bugs riding an air delivered torpedo served as the squadron logo for Marine Torpedo/Bomber Squadron 242 in the Second World War. In 1944, Bugs Bunny made a cameo appearance in Jasper Goes Hunting, a short produced by rival studio Paramount Pictures. In this cameo (animated by Robert McKimson, with Mel Blanc providing the voice), Bugs pops out of a rabbit hole, saying his usual catchphrase; Bugs then says, "I must be in the wrong picture" and then goes back in the hole. He also appears fleetingly in the 1947 Arthur Davis cartoon The Goofy Gophers The post-war era After World War II Bugs appeared in numerous cartoon shorts in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series, making his last appearance in the theatrical cartoons in 1964 with False Hare. He was directed by Friz Freleng, Robert McKimson, Arthur Davis and Chuck Jones and appeared in feature films, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit (which features the first-ever meeting between Bugs and his box-office rival Mickey Mouse), Space Jam, and the 2003 movie Looney Tunes: Back in Action. The Bugs Bunny short Knighty Knight Bugs (1958), in which a medieval Bugs Bunny trades blows with Yosemite Sam and his fire-breathing dragon (which has a cold), won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Cartoons) of 1958. Three of Chuck Jones' Bugs Bunny shorts—Rabbit Fire, Rabbit Seasoning, and Duck! Rabbit, Duck!—comprise what is often referred to as the "Duck Season/Rabbit Season" trilogy, and are considered among the director's best works. Jones' 1957 classic, What's Opera, Doc?, cast Bugs and Elmer in a parody of Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen. It has been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry, the first cartoon short to receive this honor. In the fall of 1960, ABC debuted the prime-time television program The Bugs Bunny Show. This show packaged many of the post-1948 Warners shorts with newly animated wraparounds. After two seasons, it was moved from its evening slot to reruns on Saturday mornings. The Bugs Bunny Show changed format and exact title frequently, but remained on network television for 40 years. The packaging was later completely different, with each short simply presented on its own, title and all, though some clips from the new bridging material were sometimes used as filler. After the classic cartoon era After Mel Blanc died in 1989, Jeff Bergman, Greg Burson, Billy West, and Joe Alaskey became the new voices of Bugs Bunny and many of the other Looney Tunes cast members, each taking turns doing Bugs' voice for various projects over the years. Bugs has made appearances in animated specials for network television, mostly composed of classic cartoons with bridging material added, including How Bugs Bunny Won the West, and The Bugs Bunny Mystery Special. 1980s Bugs Bunny's Busting Out All Over, however, contained no vintage clips and featured the first new Bugs Bunny cartoons in 16 years. It opened with "Portrait Of The Artist As a Young Bunny", which features a flashback of Bugs as a child thwarting a young Elmer Fudd, while its third and closing short was "Spaced Out Bunny", with Bugs being kidnapped by Marvin the Martian to be a playmate for Hugo, an Abominable Snowman-like character. (A new Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner short filled out the half hour.) Compilation films included the independently produced Bugs Bunny: Superstar, using the vintage shorts then owned by United Artists; as well as Warner Bros. efforts The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie, The Looney Looney Looney Bugs Bunny Movie, Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island, Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales and Daffy Duck's Quackbusters. He also made guest appearances in episodes of the 1990s television program Tiny Toon Adventures as the principal of Acme Looniversity and the mentor of Babs and Buster Bunny, and would later make occasional guest cameos on spinoffs Taz-Mania and Animaniacs. He appears in the beginning of Gremlins 2: The New Batch, where he tries to ride the opening Warner Bros logo, but is interrupted by Daffy Duck. Bugs has had several comic book series over the years. Western Publishing had the license for all the Warner Brothers cartoons, and produced Bugs Bunny comics first for Dell Comics, then later for their own Gold Key Comics. Dell published 58 issues and several specials from 1952 to 1962. Gold Key continued for another 133 issues. DC Comics, the sister/subsidiary company of Warner Bros., has published several comics titles since 1994 that Bugs has appeared in. Notable among these was the 2000 four-issue miniseries Superman & Bugs Bunny, written by Mark Evanier and drawn by Joe Staton. This depicted a crossover between DC's superheroes and the Warner cartoon characters. Being an Icon Like SpongeBob SquarePants for Nickelodeon and Mickey Mouse for Disney, Bugs has served as the mascot for Warner Bros. Entertainment and its various divisions. He and Mickey are the first cartoon characters to have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In the 1988 animated/live action movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Bugs was shown as one of the inhabitants of Toontown. However, since the film was being produced by Disney, Warner Bros. would only allow the use of their biggest star if he got an equal amount of screen time as Disney's biggest star, Mickey Mouse. Because of this, both characters are always together in frame when onscreen. For the same reasons, Bugs never calls Mickey by his name, only referring to him as "Doc," while Mickey calls him "Bugs." Bugs Bunny was featured in The Earth Day Special showing his displeasure on how man started mistreating the environment. He was voiced by Jeff Bergman who also voiced Porky Pig and Tweety. Return to Stardom Bugs Bunny came back to the silver screen in Box Office Bunny in 1990. This was the first Bugs Bunny cartoon short since 1964 to be released to theaters, and it was created for the Bugs Bunny 50th anniversary celebration. It was followed in 1991 by (Blooper) Bunny, a short that has gained a cult following among some animation fans for its edgy humor. Bugs made an appearance in the 1990 drug prevention video Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue. This special is notable for being the first time that somebody other than Mel Blanc voiced Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. (In this video, both characters were voiced by Jeff Bergman.) In 1997, Bugs appeared on a U.S. postage stamp, the first cartoon to be so honored, beating the iconic Mickey Mouse. The stamp is number seven on the list of the ten most popular U.S. stamps, as calculated by the number of stamps purchased but not used. The introduction of Bugs onto a stamp was controversial at the time, as it was seen as a step toward the 'commercialization' of stamp art. The postal service rejected many designs, and went with a postal-themed drawing. Avery Dennison printed the Bugs Bunny stamp sheet, which featured "a special ten-stamp design and was the first self-adhesive souvenir sheet issued by the U.S. Postal Service." Also in '97, he appeared as the deuteragonist of Space Jam, with Michael Jordan as the protagonist. In 2003, Bugs and Daffy appeared in Looney Tunes: Back in Action ''as the tritagonists, third in place behind DJ and Kate. In this story, Bugs and Daffy are up to their feuding ways again. Suddenly a sidekick without a hero, Daffy joins DJ to relocate his superspy father Damien, even if they have to beat Mr. Chairman to the Blue Monkey. All the while, Kate and Bugs tag along, both hoping to make amends with their friends. A younger version of Bugs is the main character of Baby Looney Tunes, which debuted on Cartoon Network in 2002. In the action comedy Loonatics Unleashed, his definite descendant Ace Bunny is the leader of the Loonatics team and seems to have inherited his ancestor's Brooklyn accent and comic wit. Strangely, Bugs was one of the few Looney Tunes characters who never appeared in the 2003 Duck Dodgers series. He also a main character of Lunar Tunes. In ''Bah, Humduck: a Looney Tunes Christmas, Bugs is the tetartagonist, with Daffy as the protagonist, Porky as the deuteragonist, and Priscilla as the tritagonist. In 2009 Looney Tunes: The Looney Beginning Bugs is appeared as the protagonist, with Daffy as deuteragonist, and Porky, Barnyard Dawg, Foghorn, Sylvester and Tweety as the tritagonist. Bugs has appeared in numerous video games, including the Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle ''series, ''Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout, Bugs Bunny: Rabbit Rampage ''and the similar ''Bugs Bunny in Double Trouble, Looney Tunes B-Ball, Space Jam, Looney Tunes Racing, Looney Tunes: Space Race, Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time, and its sequel, Bugs Bunny and Taz: Time Busters, Looney Tunes: Back in Action ''and the new video game ''Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal. On August 13, 2010, Warner Bros. Pictures announced that they are planning a live-action/CG-animated combo feature film based on the Looney Tunes character. Bugs appeared in film Looney Tunes and Roger Rabbit as he and Daffy team up on the case to help solve the crime in Hollywood when Roger is framed for the murder of Marvin Acme, and prove his innocence while finding the real bastard. Bugs appeared in film Looney Tunes meets King Kong as he and Daffy live in New York City with Ann Darrow. After the duo, Ann, Jack Driscoll, Carl Denham, and Charles Weston are stranded to Skull Island, after being attack King Kong, the two help Kong and Ann face their fears of the Tyrannosaurus Rex and the planes. The story begins with Bugs appeared in Looney Tunes: The Three Musketeers as a musketeer with Daffy and Tweety for Athos, Porthos and Aramis. Later in the film, later Sylvester works for Captain Rochefort and redeems himself, after that Bugs, Daffy, Sylvester, and Tweety fights over the Duke to save the musketeers and the necklace for the queen. Bugs as the hare from "The Tortoise and the Hare" in Looney Tunes Fairy Adventures along with Daffy as an ugly duckling force to save Storybook Land theme park with Red Riding hood, Hansel and Gretel and Jack from Mr. Johnson and Mr. Lawyer. The story begins with Bugs as a baby bunny and Daffy as a baby duckling who are raised by a girl named Gena in the time travel fossil world in Looney Tunes: The Founded Dinosaur. The duck and rabbit recover a dinosaur egg stolen by Elmer Fudd; not knowing what to do, they decide to take it home and raise it as their own. Bugs appeared in Looney Tunes: Justice Heroes as he and Daffy team up with Superman and the other Justice League Batman and Wonder Woman on a mission to save the world from Lex Luthor, who threatens to take over the world with the other villains. In the film Looney Tunes: Return of Kong, the sequel to Looney Tunes meets King Kong, Bugs, Daffy, Kong and Ann are returning to Skull Island along with Jack, Carl, and Charles, and to help them save the island from the greedy Captain Nils Helstrom. Return to television Bugs Bunny and the rest of the Looney Tunes gang returned to Cartoon Network in 2011 in a brand new show called'' The Looney Tunes Show, with Jeff Bergman returning to voice both Bugs and Daffy Duck. This series will also feature the characters singing original songs as well. The show debuted on May 3, 2011. A large difference between Bugs and Daffy's friendship in the show is that, whereas Bugs would hardly mind Daffy's flaws in the original cartoons, in the show Bugs is often and openly annoyed at Daffy's antics, sometimes to the point of aggression when Daffy becomes too obnouxious. Bugs appears as a baby bunny in 2 episodes of Castaras Babys. Baby Looney Tunes Bugs Bunny appears in ''Baby Looney Tunes as a baby when he was taking care by Granny. Other In AVGN Review of Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout and Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle Bugs Bunny is a rival of Angry Video Game Nerd. Category:Characters Category:Looney Tunes characters Category:Males Category:Animals Category:Cartoon characters Category:Rabbits Category:Pessimists Turned Optimists Category:Optimists Category:Geniuses Category:Smartest Category:Leaders Category:Heroes Category:Wise characters Category:Warner Bros. characters Category:Athletic